Loss of Control and Self-Regulation: The Role of Childhood Lessons
研究发现，失去个人控制会促使消费者增加自我调节行为，因为失控违背了童年学到的“控制结果”的教训，从而触发补偿机制；但若童年时父母管教宽松，失控反而可能减少自我调节。
This article demonstrates that a loss of personal control leads to an increase in self-regulatory behavior. This occurs because a loss of control puts consumers at a deficit relative to one of the major lessons they learn during their childhood, which is to have control over the outcomes of their actions. This deficit triggers a compensatory process focused on following other lessons that consumers believe they learned during their childhood. Because exerting self-regulation is another major lesson parents emphasize, consumers engage in self-regulatory behavior to compensate for a loss of personal control. However, when consumers believe their parents emphasized self-regulation less strongly during childhood (i.e., they believe their parents had a more permissive style), a loss of control can reduce self-regulatory behavior. These findings have implications for what we know about the effects of childhood experiences on adult consumer behavior, the importance of individuals’ beliefs about childhood experiences in determining adult behavior, the consequences of low personal control, and the antecedents of self-regulatory behavior.